I start to ask if he’s positive he wants to spend his precious free hours with me, but then Arthur’s looking over my head, and his brow furrows. “Lilah, don’t talk to her about—”
“Hello, friends!” Delaney says. Her voice is caught between singsong and pissed-off personal manager who didn’t know her celebrity sports star was going to cuddle with a documentarian on a jet. “Question as someone who flew on the other, less exciting plane. What are you two doing after this?”
Arthur rents a car. It isn’t a Leone.
Though it is white and sleek and shaped not unlike a beluga whale. I insist that Delaney take the front seat, she does, and then we’re off, twisting through the packed dreamscape of Monte Carlo. The hill-nestled buildings begin to thin out, fading into the surprise that is the French Riviera. Before seeing the perfect blue marina for myself, I’d assumed the French Riviera was, well, a river… in France. I was wrong. Apparently, it’s this whole coastline, and Monte Carlo is basically Navy Pier for the uber-wealthy, teeming with high-end restaurants and five-star hotels. And Arthur’s first watch photo shoot isonhis family yacht, docked in the port.
No garden today.
Arthur is carted off by photographers, and I, unsure of what to do with myself, pretend like it was my plan all along to film him getting his picture taken. Stylists flutter between photos to tweak his outfit like he’s a Ken doll, and the colossal silver-and-orange diving watch hanging from his wrist is his signature plastic accessory. Then, after an hour of that, the brand team waves in other F1 drivers they’ve accumulated: James Hawke and a slender redhead with a beard that turns out to be Jean Baudelaire, and then three more muscular, smiley men I’ve never seen in my life. There’s Yuzhe Lei and Clark Templeton from Static Racing, a gamer-slash-fashion-designer and “legendary rude man,” respectively. From Cavalli, I meet Rafael Ramirez, a baby-faced driver from Mexico who bolts once he learns I’m filming because, “Sorry, but—yeah—be right back!” But then he does come back, dubious beer in hand, to ask me exactly what us camerapeople think when they, the athletes, drop an f-bomb on a live broadcast. “Do you get mad?” he whispers. “Or is it okay?”
“Definitely okay. This isn’t live.”
“And you work with Arthur?”
I nod, and his face glows. He’s so shy and so young and so clearly smitten with Arthur, it’s adorable. “I got into driving because of him,” Rafael admits. “I hope that maybe one day we could drive together on the same team.”
“That would be nice.”
Rafael is scribbling his number on my hand when the infamous Jean Baudelaire wanders over. “I heard you’re making a movie about Bianco,” is the first thing out of the Frenchman’s mouth. After that, he’s busy drinking what looks to be a wineglass of flat Diet Pepsi.
“Arthur and the team. I’d love to feature other drivers, too. Would you be interested?”
Jean’s short, scruffy beard doesn’t conceal his grimace. “No.”
“Oh, okay.”
He takes another swig. “Fine. I’ll ask my people.”
The drivers take photos together, separately, on the top deck, leaned against the railing overlooking water so blue, so glistening, it looks fake. There are group photos, single headshots. It sort of reminds me ofThe Hunger Gamesbefore the game starts and the contestants do their best to rip each other apart.
I get my fill of behind-the-scenes footage, then stand by Delaney, who of course is also on the yacht. Why wouldn’t she be? This is Arthur’s personal life for the day, and she’s Arthur’s personal manager. “I didn’t realize Sarah scheduled you for this,” she says when she’s off the phone.
“Sorry. It was Arthur’s idea.”
“Sure.” Delaney smiles, all curiosity and no teeth. We’re alone, by a pair of closed doors. Nobody is paying any attention to us. “So,” she says, and my stomach cramps into an origami crane. “You and Arthur.”
She doesn’t waste any time. I wouldn’t, either, if I were her and my client wasn’t quite off the rails, but getting close. I watch Arthur get rearranged by a photographer, while a hairstylist anoints him with a halo of aerosol hairspray. “Shouldn’t you be talking to him about this?” I try.
Delaney shrugs. Today she’s in a pale lavender pantsuit and shiny matching heels, one foot click-clacking as she taps it next to my silent sneakers. “We both know he’d probably deny it.”
“There’s nothing to deny,” I say, doubling down for us. There’s really nowhere else to go but down. “I’m afraid of planes. Arthur knew I was freaking out and offered to help.”
“By cuddling you. For two hours.”
“It was more like a hug. A platonic, friendly hug.”
“While you slept.”
Knew I shouldn’t have drifted off. “I might’ve taken a small nap. Very short.”
Delaney’s lips lift into an analytical smile. “I’m not trying to grill you, Lilah. I just need to know what’s going on. If there’s something I should know about, I’ve been trusting that you’d tell me.”
Delaney’s questioning confirms how perfect our scheme is: She’s suspicious of our tilt-a-whirl of a power imbalance, and all we had to do was use each other as pillows on a plane. However I proceed, it’ll seem like I’m squirreling away a secret romance I don’t want her to know about. Max Black’s reckless employee, endangering Ignition’s film and Arthur’s reputation.
But… I don’t like lying to Delaney. It’s been one thing to spin stories for Max and let my anger wipe my guilty conscience away. I can’t hide behind Max’s awfulness here. This is me, lying to a woman I think I could, maybe, one day be friends with, if we’d met under other circumstances.
“I don’t want to hurt him,” I say. “I can promise you that.”
